In the space of seven months Paul Pogba has gone from telling his manager how Manchester United’s system and his role within it should be changed to suit Paul Pogba, to publicly panning that manager’s tactics after a match in which a Paul Pogba error cost two points.

The France midfielder thinks he is one of the planet’s best footballers, a Ballon d’Or owner in waiting. Mino Raiola – the agent who took him away from Old Trafford then brought him back in return for the largest ever financial cut of a transfer – has encouraged that view since 2011.

Their perception of his value is such the pair did not consider it unrealistic to demand Jose Mourinho solve a mid-season slump in Pogba’s performances by reshaping his team.

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They wanted the Frenchman to play on his preferred left side of a three-midfield and to be relieved of defensive duties so he could better express himself at the glamour end of the field.

This extraordinary request arrived a few months after Pogba missed a crucial 10 weeks of United’s campaign with a grade-three hamstring tear United staff believe was caused by the failure to respect Mourinho’s carefully calibrated training programme in using his own personal fitness trainers. Pogba then insisted he rehabilitate with his own specialists in the USA.

While these dramas – reported in this newspaper and on The Transfer Window– played out, Raiola upped the ante by offering his client’s services to Europe’s top clubs. Known by some as ‘The Pizzaman’ (he always gets his cut), Raiola was so shameless he even proposed a switch to Man City.

There were no serious offers for a player whose 2016 transfer fee from Juventus was an initial £94million and whose salary is the highest in the Premier League.

A Barcelona proposal to exchange Yerry Mina and Andre Gomes for the new World Cup winner was laughed away by United executives who consider him a key sporting and commercial revenue talent.

Mourinho attempted to refocus Pogba. He handed the 25-year-old the captaincy, reduced his defensive duties, put him on penalty kicks, kept him there after missing one, and publicly praised him.

"The truth is we are together for two years and a couple of weeks, and I've never been so happy with him as I am now," said Mourinho last month. “He's working well, playing well. He does for the fans, he does for the team, and that's what I want.”

A few days earlier Pogba had strode out following United's first game of the season and told journalists who'd asked if he was happy at the club that: "There are things that I cannot say, otherwise I will get fined."

Mourinho having smothered that verbal hand grenade, Pogba went for the jugular. Following last weekend's draw with Wolverhampton, a match in which his own naivety cost the lead, Pogba went to reporters again. This time he questioned Mourinho's tactical approach, with words that could hardly have been selected to cause more damage.

Mourinho's response to Pogba's cry that United “should attack, attack, attack” was to end the indulgence. The midfielder was told he would never captain United again. In front of his team-mates, Pogba was told that it was a manager's job to determine the way of playing and a footballer's duty to implement it.

(Image: AFP)

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While some of Pogba's compatriots praised the player's “bravery” in the overt “attack, attack, attack” on his manager, most in football recognised that the Frenchman had crossed a line. That Pogba – encouraged by his Dutch-Italian agent - felt it appropriate says much about his character. And his history.

Pogba is hyper-talented technically and blessed with an extraordinary physique. United poached him from Le Havre as a 16-year-old. Before his 19 birthday, before he'd started a single league game, Raiola had promised to secure him a seven-digit salary if he let the agent find him a new club.

He went to Juventus despite Sir Alex Ferguson's best efforts to prevent the move. "There are one or two football agents I simply do not like, and Mino Raiola, Paul Pogba’s agent is one of them,” Ferguson later said. “I distrusted him from the moment I met him.”

Despite this, United brought Pogba back to the club four years' later, making him their most expensive and best-paid player. Part of the attraction to Ed Woodward was Pogba's large social media presence and his value to the executive vice-chairman's commercial marketing.

(Image: Manchester United)

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Those who have worked with Pogba as coach or player since that transfer describe an individual who thinks he is better than he actually is. Pogba, it is said, thinks he understands football, when it is actually the weakest aspect of his game. He is not as intelligent as he thinks he is, and far more arrogant than his performances merit.

“He doesn't understand the game well,” says one United source. “He's a central midfielder. 'When I don't have the ball I need to organise. When my team has the ball I have to go higher on the pitch and work as a number eight.' And he can't do it.

“The guy wants to play free in midfield, yet he chooses positions on the pitch where the game is not. You see him hiding from the opposition, especially in the big games. To have an opinion [on tactics] he needs to be an example. If he was a hard worker, if he attacked and defended, then he could be upset.”

Yet Pogba is upset. Pogba has made himself the biggest problem in United's squad. And the Pogba problem has to be dealt with by his manager. The futures of both men will be determined by it.